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Core Duo Macs

Daniel Knight - 2006.09.06

When Apple made the switch from PowerPC CPUs to Intel in 2006, the state-of-the-art CPU was Intel’s Core Duo processor, which was based on Intel’s 32-bit Pentium M architecture, which was originally designed for mobile use. The Core Duo was Intel’s first dual-core mobile processor, and it was used in all first generation Intel Macs save one, the single-core Mac mini Core Solo.

Code named Yonah, the first generation of Intel Core processors came in single- and dual-core versions, although the Core Solo is identical to the Core Duo except that it has one of its two processor cores disabled. There is speculation that Intel did this to unload CPUs with a defect in just one core.

One of the key design requirements of Core Duo was low power consumption, with a target draw of 25 Watts or less, although the top-end 2.16 GHz Core Duo ended up consuming 31 Watts. The Yohan processors use a 65 nm process and have a 2 MB level 2 cache, which is shared by both cores in the Core Duo processor. It accesses system memory using a 667 MHz data bus.

Going forward, Macs based on the original Core architecture had two significant drawbacks – they can only support up to 2 GB of memory and can only run in 32-bit mode, which means they were left behind when Apple released OS X 10.7 Lion, a 64-bit only operating system, in July 2011.

Some Mac mini and iMac users have successfully replaced their CPUs with Core 2 Duo CPUs, which support 64-bit operation, but the standard firmware is strictly 32-bit.

The consumer MacBook and Mac mini models use Intel GMA 950 graphics that share system memory, while the MacBook Pro and iMac models have dedicated Radeon X1600 graphics with their own dedicated video memory. The GMA 950 graphics processor runs at 400 MHz and doesn’t have a lot of the more advanced features (hardware transform and lighting, advanced vertex shaders) found in most graphics chips of the era. The Radeon X1600 is far better for 3D gaming and handling video codecs, especially at higher resolutions.